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Novice entrepreneurs may have had their first taste of financial panic this past year, but to the founders of II By IV Design Associates, recessions signify opportunity rather than anguish.

"We started during a recession; we had $500 between the two of us," Keith Rushbrook recalls.

"We've been very fortunate," Dan Menchions adds. "We came from nothing."

It may have been nearly 20 years ago, but their story is strikingly familiar: The stock market collapsed in the late '80s. Soon after, Rushbrook and Menchions, interior design graduates from Ryerson Polytechnic Institute and Humber College of Applied Arts and Technology respectively, who had barely begun their careers, were laid off from their respective design firms.

Out on their own, they invested as wisely as they knew how: "We spent all our money on our business cards," Rushbrook admits.

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Surprisingly, the cards, with the firm's playful tongue-in-cheek title, paid off. "The owner of Yuk Yuk's (comedy club) saw our business card and said, 'Wow, that's a really cool card. Get those guys in here!' and that was our very, very, very first job!"

The lesson Rushbrook and Menchions learned that day – the day II By IV took off – was one they've never forgotten.

And while the lesson back then was about how they should brand themselves, they believe the key to their recession-resistant success ever since has been their ability to help clients find their own identity; their style, their brand.

"It's not about us. It really is about the project and the people and the process," Menchions says. "Other firms will tell you that, but I really and truly believe we do that for our clients."

In fact, their practice sounds almost therapeutic, the way they plumb the amorphous desires of those who seek their help.

"Clients know what they want," Menchions says. "They may not be able to visualize or verbalize their thoughts, and that's okay, but they know; once they've actually seen what we do for them and we present it."

II By IV has grown fat on this recipe for success. The firm now includes a staff of 18 that works in a spotlessly white, blindingly well-lit studio at 77 Mowat Ave., the Carpet Factory building in trendy Liberty Village. The studio shelves are lined with awards; the ceilings are gloriously high.

And creatively, the firm has expanded far beyond the nightclub scene on which Rushbrook and Menchions cut their teeth.

"We do everything from residential, development, hotel, cruise line, office, retail, restaurants, nightclubs, all of it, and each one of them is completely different," Menchions says.

"They all come with a different terminology and a different language, and we have to interpret that."

Sometimes they have little more to go on than a name, such as when they designed the interiors of Amexon Development's South Beach Condos + Lofts, at Lake Shore Blvd. W. and Park Lawn Rd.

"That's all they gave us: 'The project is called 'South Beach,'" Rushbrook says. "And yeah, we could have done a beachy theme, but (we decided to) go to South Beach. 'Let's research what are all the iconic elements that make up South Beach and Miami and (let's bring) all that here.'"

As for how the project turned out? "You really need to see it first-hand," Menchions says proudly, adding that, despite having launched only seven months ago, the development has already sold 70 per cent of its luxurious suites.

Over the last 19 years, Rushbrook and Menchions have really gotten a kick out of how far-reaching and yet unassuming the impact of interior design can be.

In fact, chances are if you've graced any of Toronto's busiest outlets, you've probably walked through a II By IV space. The sleek, marble-lined CN Tower restaurant and café? II By IV did that. The dark, intimate elegance of the C5 Restaurant at the Royal Ontario Museum? II By IV again. Even the iconic black-and-yellow Beer Store you walk in and out of every weekend? You guessed it.

"You know what I love about what we do? Everything that we interact with on a daily basis or do has been designed by somebody. Everything," Rushbrook says with delight. "And when you think about that, in that way, the impact that we have as interior designers, on someone's life, on someone's experience, is pretty huge."

As the building industry lurches through another recession, it seems it's this outlook that keeps Rushbrook and Menchions enthusiastic about the future.

"We were very fortunate to find our careers at a very young age, and feel really passionate about it," Rushbrook says.

"We still feel the same about it today, as we did then, and it's a different playing field right now, but it's absolutely fantastic."

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